The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death: Reflections on Revenge, Germophobia, and Laser Hair Removal

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Overview

Laurie Notaro has an uncanny ability to attract insanity–and leave readers doubled over with laughter. In The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death, she experiences the popular phenomenon of laser hair removal (because at least one of her chins should be stubble-free); bemoans the scourge of the Open Mouth Coughers on America’s airplanes; welcomes the newest ex-con (yay, a sex offender!) to her neighborhood; and watches, against her own better judgment, every Discovery Health Channel special on parasites and tapeworms that has ever aired–resulting in an overwhelming fear that a worm the size of a python will soon come a-knocking on her back door.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer says that Laurie Notaro is “a scream, the freak-magnet of a girlfriend you can’t wait to meet for a drink to hear her latest story.” With The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death, Notaro proves she’s not only funny but resigned to the fact that you can’t look bad ass in a Prius. Don’t even try.

Enter Laurie Notaro’s THE IDIOT GIRL AND THE FLAMING TANTRUM OF DEATH Essay Contest!

OFFICIAL RULES—NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN.
Open to legal residents of the U.S. who are 18 years of age or older as of June 30th, 2009. Contest ends June 30th, 2009.

TO ENTER:
Enter online at any time beginning at 12:00 Midnight, Eastern Daylight Savings Time (EDT), June 1, 2009 through 11:59 PM, (EDT), June 30, 2009, by emailing bpgmarketing@randomhouse.com with the subject line “Idiot Girl” and attach an essay of no more than 450 words about your funniest Idiot Girl adventure. You must include your name, age, mailing address and valid email address along with your original contest submission (English language only; 450 words or less.) Limit one entry per person. Only entries submitted electronically in accordance with these rules will be eligible for consideration. Mechanically reproduced entries not accepted. All entries become the property of Random House, Inc. (“Sponsor”) upon submission. All applicable federal, state and local laws and regulations apply. Contest void wherever prohibited or restricted by law. Entries received from persons residing in geographic areas in which entry is not permissible will be disqualified.
Publisher/author is not responsible for lost/late/misdirected entries or computer malfunctions.

WINNER SELECTION:
One (1) Grand Prize Winner and three (3) first prize winners will be chosen by the Sponsor’s Marketing Department for having the best writing style and the most outrageous Idiot Girl tale. Winner will be picked from all eligible entries on or about July 31st, 2009. The decision of the judges will be final and binding in all matters relating to the Contest.

PRIZES:
One (1) Grand Prize – winner will have their essay story posted on author’s website, www.laurienotaro.com for one (1) year, AND have their name used as a character name in Laurie’s next novel published by Sponsor; each of three (3) First Prize winners will receive One (1) copy of THE IDIOT GIRL AND THE FLAMING TANTRUM OF DEATH in trade paperback format (ISBN: 9780812975741). (Approximate retail value of all prizes: $42.00.)

WHO CAN PARTICIPATE:
Open to legal residents of the U.S., who are 18 years of age or older as of June 30, 2009. Employees of Random House, Inc., (including Random House’s parent, subsidiaries, affiliates, and agencies) and immediate families and persons living in the same household of such employees are not eligible.

GENERAL CONDITIONS:
All Prize Winners must be 18 years of age or older. Noncompliance with any condition will result in disqualification and selection of an alternate Winner. Grand Prize Winner will be notified by e-mail on or about August 1, 2009 and First Prize Winners will be notified by e-mail on or about August 15th, 2009. Return of any prize notification as undeliverable, or failure of potential winners to accept a prize, respond to notification attempts or return completed releases within required timeframe may result in disqualification and an alternate winner will be selected at Sponsor’s discretion. No transfer/cash substitution of prize permitted. Sponsor reserves the right to substitute a prize of equal or greater value if, at any time following selection of the winners, any portion of the prizes become unavailable for any reason. Prizes are nontransferable and must be accepted as rewarded. Winners will be required to execute affidavits of eligibility, liability releases, warranty and indemnification releases and, except where prohibited by law, use of name or likeness releases and return them within seven (7) days of issuance. Winners will be required to execute an agreement confirming, for the benefit of Sponsor, the winner’s conveyance of copyright in the entry to Sponsor. Publisher/author reserves the right to post, remove and/or modify this contest on the Internet at any time. Publisher/author reserves the right to disqualify entries from anyone tampering with the Internet entry process. If, for any reason, the contest or any drawing is not capable of running as planned by reason of damage by computer virus, worms, bugs, tampering, unauthorized intervention, technical limitations or failures, or any other causes which, in the sole opinion of the Publisher/author, could compromise, undermine or otherwise affect the Official Rules, administration, security, fairness or proper conduct of the contest, the Publisher/author reserves the right and absolute discretion to modify these Official Rules and/or to cancel, terminate, modify or suspend the contest. In the event of termination or cancellation, the Winners will be selected from all eligible entries received before termination. Publisher/author assume no responsibility for any error, omission, interruption, deletion, defect, delay in operation or transmission, communications line failure, theft, destruction, or unauthorized access to the site. Publisher/author is not responsible for injury or damage to any computer, other equipment, or person relating to or resulting from participation in the contest, or from downloading materials or accessing the site. Contest is subject to applicable laws and regulations in U.S. Participants release the Publisher/author, its agencies, and assigns from any liability and/or loss resulting from participation in contest or acceptance or use of any prize. By their entry, participants fully and unconditionally agree to these rules and judges decisions, which are final and binding. By acceptance of prize, Winners agree to rules and Publisher’s/author’s use of their name/likeness for commercial purposes without notification / compensation, except where prohibited by law.

TO OBTAIN THE NAMES OF THE WINNERS:
For the names of the Winners, available after September 30, 2009, send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to be received by September 15, 2009 to: The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death Contest Winners, 1745 Broadway, 22nd Floor, NY, NY 10019, Attn: Rochelle Clark.

GOVERING LAW:
All disputes and questions regarding the construction, validity, interpretation and enforceability of these Official Rules, or the rights and obligations of any participant, and the Sponsor, shall be governed by, and construed in accordance with the laws of the State of New York, without giving effect to any choice of law or conflict of law rules or provisions that would cause the application of the laws of any jurisdiction other than New York. The invalidity or unenforceability of any provision of these Official Rules shall not affect the validity or enforceability of any other provision. If any such provision is determined to be invalid or otherwise unenforceable, these Official Rules shall be construed in accordance with their terms as if the invalid or unenforceable provision was not contained therein.

PROMOTION SPONSOR:
Random House, Inc. , 1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019.

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Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

In her latest collection of essays, Notaro (The Idiot Girl's Action-Adventure Club) turns out a double-handful of chuckle-worthy vignettes, looking at episodes of panic on an airplane, spying on guests at a mountain resort, learning to live with the ex-con down the street and, of course, handling the numerous disappointments and betrayals of the human body. Notaro blends sardonic, often self-deprecating comedy with disarming sincerity, delving into weight gain and body hair issues without hesitation, but staying closer to house, hearth, and everyday life with husband and dog. Most of the time, her quips rise to the occasion, but occasionally fall flat (as in "Death of a Catchphrase"). Although the majority of Notaro's musings are light-hearted, she reveals an affecting serious side in her essay on a pet's death. With plenty of humorous insight into the everyday debacles of an average gal from Arizona, these entertaining essays should make satisfying, bite-sized beach reading.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780812975741
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Publication date: 4/28/2009
Pages: 240
Sales rank: 682,657
Product dimensions: 5.10 (w) x 7.90 (h) x 0.70 (d)

Meet the Author

Laurie Notaro was born in Brooklyn, New York, and raised in Phoenix, Arizona. She packed her bags for Eugene, Oregon, once she realized that since she was past thirty, her mother could no longer report her as a teenage runaway. She is the author of The Idiot Girls’ Action-Adventure Club, Autobiography of a Fat Bride, I Love Everybody, We Thought You Would Be Prettier, An Idiot Girl’s Christmas, and the novel There’s a (Slight) Chance I Might Be Going to Hell. She is currently at work on a plan B (to take effect when her book contract runs out), which includes selling hot dogs at Costco, selling hot dogs from a street cart, selling hot dogs at high school football games, or being the stop sign holder for road construction crews. At press time, she is still married, and she has an adorably disobedient dog that wears sweaters and loves chicken strips. (Clearly, Notaro has no children.)

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Read an Excerpt

The Lodgers

It could not have sounded more divine.

Tall, shadowy pine trees; a bubbling creek with clear, pure water; meadow upon meadow of swaying wildflowers; temperature in the seventies, and a cute little log cabin with a loft at a lodge.

When my husband suggested we get away for the weekend and celebrate my birthday in the White Mountains, I couldn’t have been more enthusiastic.

To Arizonans, the White Mountains are an incredible escape a mere four hours’ drive away; to the rest of the world, they’re the place where logger Travis Walton said he got sucked up by a UFO and then disappeared for five days while aliens put things in places unseemly. To me, they were a place with no phones, no television sets, no computers, no fax machines, just a cabin with a wood-burning stove, a feather bed, and a forty-degree drop in temperature, which I especially needed since I had just received a zipper burn on the back of my neck from my dress by engaging in the mortally dangerous activity of going to get the mail while it was still sunny outside.

When I told my mother about my birthday plans, she simply said, “Must be a popular place. Your sister is heading up there, too, but at least her boyfriend sprang for a fancy hotel. Why won’t your husband pay for a hotel? Why are you staying in an old shack with a woodstove? How can that be fun? I bet you’ll leave with a nice case of lice.”

“We’re not staying in a shack. It’s a cabin with a feather bed and a loft,” I said, thinking that she was one to talk. I’ve spent a great deal of time and effort in therapy trying to forget the majority of my family summer vacations. They were spent driving roughly far enough into the desert and away from our house that we couldn’t physically run back to it after it was discovered that my parents had only sprung for one hotel room for the five of us and it was 117 degrees outside, making escape far too sweaty an option. To make matters even more closely resemble the comfort level of Guantanamo Bay, my mother consistently struck a claim for one of the double beds as we entered the room by throwing her purse on it, digging out her bottle of Tylenol and her pack of Winstons, and then sprawling out with her eyes closed and her hand over her head. This not only left the rest of the family one bed for cramped quarters but created an undeniable bounty of opportunity for pinching, slapping, and pushing between my sisters and me and sometimes even my dad, to which my mother would respond by roaring from her yacht of a bed two feet away, “SHUT UP all of you! If you people haven’t noticed, I’m on VACATION!” We were additionally blessed as a slight, cool drizzle fell like mist as soon as we drove into the lodge driveway and then checked in. As I opened the door to the White Mountains cabin, it was exactly as I had pictured it–well, outside of the shag rug and the black fur of mold in the shower. My husband sighed peacefully, put his hands on his hips, and looked around. “A whole weekend of this!” he commented excitedly. “Can you even believe it? Listen. I don’t hear a thing but that slight prattle of rain hitting the tin roof.”

“Wow,” I said, smiling wide. “To think, four hours ago, the seat belt left a burn so extensive we could have added a side of A.1. and called it dinner.”

I unzipped my bags and unpacked my array of snack options, then stood gazing out the window at the steady, patient dribble of rain. My husband spread out on the couch and cracked open a book. “This is the life,” he said with a smile before he started to read.

“Wow,” I said, still staring out the window. “You gotta love this rain.”

“Yep,” my husband said without looking up from his book.

“Love the rain,” I added. “Oh, I do, I do. I dooooo.”

I walked around the cabin, rolled around on the feather bed, and when I was done, it was still raining.

“What time is it?” I asked.

“Two-thirty,” my husband answered, and returned to his book.

“Hmmmm,” I pondered aloud. “Are you hungry?”

“You just ate a pack of Twinkies, four bags of chocolate Twizzlers, and twenty-two servings of Funyuns on the way up here,” he said, not looking at me. “I got full just by watching you.” I walked around the cabin again, checked for stains on the sheets, and to see if the people before us had left any foreign hairs in the bathroom, because even though my own bathroom may be filthy as a truck stop, I at least know the filth is mine and from where it has emanated. Strange, unknown filth is another story altogether, and I am saddened to report that an errant hair– belonging to neither my husband nor myself–made a rather obnoxious appearance at the bottom of a hot tub in our hotel room and absolutely ruined our wedding night. My new husband, however, was not grossed out enough to refrain from pointing the video camera at it and pressing the record button, leading to an odd and uncomfortable situation later when my family viewed our honeymoon tape, thus forcing my mother to drag me into the kitchen to say, “That in there is a little sick. It’s not too late. The pope will understand. You can still walk away.”

After not finding any hobo hairs in the shower, I climbed up to the loft and looked at the rain from the window up there.

“What time is it?” I called from the loft.

“Two thirty-two,” my husband answered with a sigh.

“Are you hungry yet?” I asked.

“Let’s play a game,” my husband suggested. “We could play ‘I’ll Give You a Dollar for Every Hour That You Don’t Speak a Word.’”

“Hmmm, that’s odd,” I said. “Across the way at the lodge, a person on the third floor just looked directly at me and then shut their curtains really fast, like in a huff!”

“Why are you spying on people, Mrs. Kravitz?” he replied.

“Please come down from there before we find out that the person you’re spying on is a sniper.”

“I’m not spying,” I insisted. “I’m just . . . soaking in my surroundings. I’m taking in the scenery, and discovering who our fellow lodgers are.”

“You know, this is how Hitchcock movies start,” he warned me. “And then before you know it, I’ll be the one running through a cornfield being stalked by a crop duster because my wife had to spend her birthday peeking in other people’s windows.”

“I saw something in the window and I looked as an automatic reflex. You know that I am curious by nature,” I said. “If it was a pubic hair, you’d be the one taking pictures of it by now.”

“And you were the one who said, ‘Don’t worry, my parents will think it’s funny,’” he responded. “Now they look at me like I showed them a movie of what happened in that hot tub before we even got there.”

“Oh, shut up, they totally thought it was funny,” I said as I climbed down the ladder from the loft. “I’m going to take a walk around the pond, see what I can see.”

“You mean spy,” my spouse said.

“I mean see,” I iterated. “There’s a little lake next to the lodge, I’m just going to go down and poke around.”

“All right, fine, I’ll come with you,” he said, putting his book down. “I don’t want to get a knock on the door in an hour telling me that you’ve lodged yourself in a dumbwaiter or gotten stuck in a tree trying to get a better view inside of someone’s room, Harriet the Spy.”

As we left the cabin, I noticed a sweet scene near the lake as a young mother lifted her rather new infant up out of the stroller and faced the baby toward the water. “Look at that new mom showing her baby the ducks and the ducklings!” I exclaimed.

“How cute. Isn’t that cute?”

“It’s all adorable,” my husband said as he put his arm around me tenderly.

“Did you just see that?” I gasped as I pointed to the thirdfloor window of the lodge. “The curtain in that window whipped closed the second I looked up there!”

“I will give you two dollars for every ten minutes you don’t peek into someone else’s room,” my husband said. “Or dessert! I’ll buy dessert!”

“Oh, well, that will be nice,” I replied. “Fat Girl Eats Gargantuan Chocolate Cake Alone While Husband Looks On in Silence and Other Diners Think to Themselves, ‘Poor Husband with the Fat Wife. Why Can’t He Stop Her? She’s Just Getting Fatter.’” This issue, in itself, has been a thorn in our marriage, because although I married a truly, really, super-nice guy, he has a defect. An unforgivable, loathsome, irritating defect. To me, it’s horrifying and at times nearly repulsive, but I’m just being honest here by admitting that my husband is not a Dessert Guy.

I know. Even though it finally put me at ease by blowing a hole in my theory that he might be gay (listen–if you’ve played beard as many times as I have, both knowingly and unknowingly, you’ll find yourself looking at even your dad with doubtful eyes), there’s something about a man who would carelessly abandon his wife when it came to her favorite course. There’s something about a man who can simply too easily declare himself a traitor when the waiter finally brings “the little menu,” begging off because he’s “too full,” “would rather have another beer,” or is “not really in the mood.” I mean, I just want to scream, flick him on the head with the back end of a spoon, and inform him in a quiet, yet strong (hissing) voice, “Let’s really think about this. When’s the last time I asked you to do something for your benefit?” If there’s anything sadder than a chunky woman scarfing down a dessert all by her lonesome, it’s a fat girl with no boobs, but eating cake by yourself in public is pretty damn sad. Dessert should always be a group activity; it is that happy of an event that everyone needs to partake, lest those with the least self-control feel a little intimidated by the one in the group with an offensive 13 percent body-fat number (which I view as tragic, anyway; should we be shipwrecked together and find ourselves on a barren island, my body can survive for years off the stockpile in my ass alone plus an additional season for each upper arm, but Miss 13 Percent, sadly, will be dead by sundown). If a bite of chocolate mousse is so entirely offensive to select group members, let this be known: I’m not asking you to eat as much as me, I’m just asking you to engage. You can pretend, for all I care, take only one bite, it leaves more for me, anyway, but GODDAMN IT, don’t make me eat dessert alone at this stage in the game; it’s the least you can do for your fellow man.

“You’ll buy dessert,” I said carefully, laying wide the trap, “but I hate eating it alone.”

“I’m not a Dessert Guy,” my husband shot back strongly.

“I think I need a closer look at the lodge.” • • •

An hour later, in the lodge dining room as my bananas Foster was being set ablaze by our waiter, I was clapping gleefully in wild anticipation as my husband held a fork aimed at the flaming plate of joy and love as I had instructed–well, almost.

“This is the part where we clap!” I growled to him under my smile, still keeping the beat.

Just as we were about to dig in, I heard an odd noise.

TINK-thud-thud. TINK-thud-thud.

When I turned around to see what the noise was, I saw a man in his late thirties, early forties, with messy hair, talking to the hostess.

“Are you selling food?” he asked her.

“Do you mean to ask if we’re open?” the hostess responded, looking a little confused.

The man stood there, looking at her for a long, long, long time.

“Uh, uh, um, yeah,” he finally said.

TINK-thud-thud. TINK-thud-thud, I heard again, and this time it was getting louder.

“Yes, we’re open,” the hostess assured him, to which he nodded and vanished.

TINK-thud-thud.

“What is that noise?” I turned back to ask my husband, and that’s when I noticed that my dessert fire was totally out and I had missed most of the bananas Foster pregame show.

My husband shook his head and chewed on a rum-soaked banana.

“This is good,” he said.

“I told you,” I said with a giggle as I dug my fork in. “Look at what you’ve been missing all of these years when you just sat there and watched me eat like I was a zoo animal.”

TINK-thud-thud.

“What is that?” I asked him again, and that’s when I saw his eyes widen.

And the sound got louder, and louder, and louder until it was directly behind me.

TINK-thud-thud. TINK-thud-thud.

Out of the corner of my eye, as I pretended to be exceptionally perplexed by the shape of a banana, I saw the cause of the commotion: a woman who had the body shape of a pretzel nugget passing by our table, moving with the ease of an iceberg. In each effort of mobility, she raised her flabby, enormous arm with all of her collective energy, lifting her metal cane, which had somehow lost its rubber-stopper-sound-muffler end, then ramming it heartily into the floor, after which she would clomp her huge feet.

TINK-thud-thud.

From the corner of my other eye, I saw my husband swoop in with a spoon and suck up a large percentage of the melted ice cream and the gooey, ooey, rich caramel.

“Don’t get carried away,” I cautioned. “From now on you can poke at it with your fork and maybe move stuff around, but the rest of it is mine.”

After the woman had passed, a hulking presence behind me blocked out most of the available light, and it took every ounce of self-control I had not to turn around to see if I was about to be eaten by Lord Voldemort. Slowly, the figure passed by our table like a storm cloud, and I saw it was the man with the messy hair who had asked the hostess if she was selling food. He had the biggest boobs I had ever seen on a man, big enough to not only benefit from restraints but require brake lights. His T-shirt, which had perky little capped lady sleeves, stretched brazenly across his boisterous bosoms at the same level of stress that had caused the hem to hover over his belt, exposing just enough belly to make witnesses cringe at the impropriety and check their own waistband. Bringing up his rear was a pear-shaped gentleman, very heavy in the derrière, with graying temples, who appeared to be the patriarch of the group. One additional man, who also looked to be in his late thirties, completed the group, and his outstanding physical characteristic was that one eye was sunk about a half inch lower than the other, and his skin emitted a pallid, waxy glow, almost as if he had freshly woken from a feverish bout of malaria. His spine slumped forward and a wet stain, roughly the size of a diseased liver, marked his shirt, stretching from his shoulder almost to his midsection.

The entire restaurant fell quiet with a hush that was solid and impenetrable as the family shuffled around their table and took their seats. There was no discussion, no small talk; they were every bit as mute as their fellow diners. All eyes were on them, drinking in their oddity, their lopsided eyes, their stains, and, of course, the mammary glands.

Slowly, as the group opened their menus to see what type of food was for sale, a murmur began to fill the restaurant back up again with the necessary noise.

“It’s a family or a gang,” I informed my husband in the smallest whisper, which I intentionally laced with intrigue. “Only crime or genetics can bind those kind of characters together.”

“Family,” my husband volleyed immediately. “I couldn’t even imagine how many prison populations you’d have to cull to produce that sort of show. And no neck tattoos, dead giveaway. Plus, if it was a gang, who do think is the brains of the operation over there?”

I looked back over at the table and saw that all of them had an equally hollow look in their eyes, although they were all looking in different directions–out the window, at the front of the menu, at a fork–and their jaws hung wide open, as if they were buckets tipped at an angle.

“Do families like that really go on vacation?” I asked, finding it hard to believe. “I thought they just stayed home, added more newspapers to the already-six-foot-high stack, and watched their cats breed.”

Then I wondered what my own family would have been like on vacation if none of us had ever moved away from home, and I imagined it would be at some casino hotel with a good view of downtown Phoenix. Around the dinner table at the all-you-caneat chicken fingers and meat loaf buffet would be my father, who no longer spoke because of his seventeen stress-induced strokes, and myself and my two sisters as the three of us pinched, slapped, and threw garnishes at each other while my mother remained back in the room, sprawled out on one of the two double beds with her hand over her head, enjoying the morphine stomach pump she’d paid a doctor from Tijuana to implant.

Not a pretty picture, either.

“But what if they’re holed up here in a cabin after pulling a job?” I asked my husband.

“A job?” he choked out. “Are you serious? Which one of them would you say isn’t on disability? The man asked the hostess if she was selling food. I doubt if all of their brain cells pooled together are active enough to pull off the top of a Jell-O cup, let alone a heist.”

“No, I’m telling you. Look at them over there, all lost in a whirlpool of criminal thought,” I insisted as the man with the google eyes tried to catch a reflection of himself on the back of his spoon. “Not all scallywags are deviant and smart. Just like in any group, there are bound to be the ones who took Beginning Larceny more than once, you know. They’re the ones on the short prison bus.”

“Are you that bored that you really need to fabricate some drama?”myhusband asked. “Because if you are, I’ll sit you down on the couch and turn on theTVfor our next vacation.We’re supposed to be relaxing, and taking it easy. But all you seem to be interested in doing is getting yourself all worked up about a family whose tempo is considerably slack and who you believe is the James gang. Well, they’re not. They’re just a bunch of people with potholed DNA looking for the cheapest thing on the menu, I promise.”

“Maybe they’re planning on robbing us,” I added. “Maybe they’re planning on robbing everyone here. This lodge is in the middle of nowhere. No one would hear a thing.”

“Yes, we’re at a cabin in the middle of nowhere,” my husband reminded me as he took the last bite of my bananas Foster.

“We’re not on the Riviera, we’re not in the Caribbean, we’re not even in Phoenix. What is the most valuable thing people bring with them to a log cabin? An iPod and a bag of marshmallows. I doubt there’s a safe behind the microwave at the front desk with Vanderbilt jewels in it, and if someone wants our bag of marshmallows, I know I’m not the one willing to wrestle them to the ground for it.”

“Listen,” I hissed. “All I know is that someone has been peeping at me through windows, and so far, the Clan of the Cave Bear over there are my best candidates.”

“Are you done with dessert?” my husband asked curtly as he took his napkin from his lap and placed it on the table. “’Cause I’d like to get out of here before you start putting people under citizen’s arrest for having lopsided eyes and giant man boobs.”

“I bet it’s a disguise,” I mumbled under my breath as I followed him out. “I bet they’re faking being a special-needs family.” For the rest of the night, while my husband sat on the porch with his iPod earphones inserted in both ears, I couldn’t stop thinking about that family. The facts fit, in my opinion; none of it added up. Why would they take a vacation all the way out here? They didn’t look like the outdoors type. It wasn’t like they were going to go hiking or skiing with their walking aids and huge butts. And there were no phones at the lodge, no televisions, no radio. What could they be doing all day? Over dinner they hadn’t said one word to each other as far as I could tell, so conversation was out of the question. They didn’t look particularly happy, or like they were on vacation. And, if the oldest “son” had to ask the hostess if she was “selling” food as opposed to “Are you open?” they clearly didn’t get too much social interaction. I had only one feasible explanation for the whole scenario.

Bandits.

Then, as I was peeking out the window, I saw the group of them emerge from the lodge restaurant and head over to the biggest cabin on the property. I knew how much our cabin had cost, and it was an arm and a leg for a double bed with polyester sheets, a pellet stove, and dirty bathroom. Their cabin was a twostory deal with picture windows all along the back that looked out right over the lake.

“For a quick getaway!” I whispered to myself.

I jumped when I heard a noise behind me, and I saw our front door open.

“What if there’s a machine gun in that cane?” I asked my husband when he stepped back into the cabin and pulled an earphone out. “The rubber stopper was off of it, and there could easily be a trigger in that handle.”

“One more word and I’m putting this back in,” he said, nodding to the earphone. “You’re being ridiculous.”

“What could they be doing over there? They have the big, huge, expensive cabin, you know,” I added. “What are they doing over there? They didn’t even talk to one another.”

“That’s how you know they’re a family,” my husband insisted.

“Hand me the marshmallows so when they come to conquer us I can throw them our riches to avoid getting mowed down by a piece of medical equipment.”

Then he gave me a dirty look, put his earphone back in, and went outside.

From across the way, I saw the clan mammary male lumber toward the front window, give me a long, solid stare like a Bigfoot, then reach over and shut the curtains.

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The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death: Reflections on Revenge, Germophobia, and Laser Hair Removal

Overview

Pick Up In Store

Available on NOOK devices and apps Nook Devices NOOK HD/HD+ Tablet NOOK NOOK Color NOOK Tablet Tablet/Phone NOOK for Windows 8 Tablet NOOK for iOS NOOK for Android NOOK Kids for iPad PC/Mac NOOK for Windows 8 NOOK for PC NOOK for Mac NOOK Study NOOK for Web

All Available Formats & Editions

Customers Who Bought This Also Bought

More About This Book

Overview

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

Product Details

Related Subjects

Meet the Author

Read an Excerpt

Customer Reviews

5 Star

4 Star

3 Star

2 Star

1 Star

Your Rating:

Your Recommendations:

Barnes & Noble.com Review Rules

Reviews by Our Customers Under the Age of 13

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Recommend other products that relate to your review. Just search for them below and share!

Love her writing style. Totally cracks me up.

Loved it!!!

Light Humor

awesome!!

Laurie Notaro continues being awesome!

Mischievous, warped, and funny!

Juvenile humor

Okay for a minute!

She is EVERY ditsy woman!!!! ?

Available on NOOK devices and apps

Nook Devices

NOOK HD/HD+ Tablet

NOOK

NOOK Color

NOOK Tablet

Tablet/Phone

NOOK for Windows 8 Tablet

NOOK for iOS

NOOK for Android

NOOK Kids for iPad

PC/Mac

NOOK for Windows 8

NOOK for PC

NOOK for Mac

NOOK Study

NOOK for Web